


A Ripped Ophelia

by HariSlate



Series: Raffles Week [3]
Category: Raffles - E. W. Hornung
Genre: Gen, a new burrow for us both, mackenzie has gone too far, rafflesweek, the albany
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-12
Updated: 2017-03-12
Packaged: 2018-10-02 23:38:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,198
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10230557
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HariSlate/pseuds/HariSlate
Summary: Raffles and Bunny return to the Albany to find an intruder.Written for Raffles Week Day Three: A new burrow for us both.





	

I am ashamed to say that I was nervous that night, even before I had run up those further debts. I standing outside Raffles’ door for fifteen minutes before I finally knocked. I had written once or twice, but I had always sensed that he was uninterested. I was a relic of his past, that I should turn up here when I was in trouble was ludicrous. I almost turned around and left when I saw a gentleman walk up the stairs and knock on his door. I had attempted to look inconspicuous but I know I felt his eyes upon me. A couple of minutes later I knocked.

His face when he opened the door is one of those that is fixed in my memory. I have a few, mental images of Raffles at his best. His face for the first time in ten years, I was so worried I would never see it again after that moment. You must know that I had no idea, no intention of what my life was to be after that night.

He looked confused, as though he didn’t know what this stranger was doing on his doorstep but he was resolved to make them feel welcome. He smiled the wide smile of the confident gentleman, impossible to shake. I quickly explained my reason for being there, tripping over the words in my hurry to justify myself. His smile only became wider, he beckoned me in and took my coat, offered me a cigarette and a glass of whiskey. Offered his regret that he was not alone but he would not miss this chance at a reunion.

And so I saw Raffles’ rooms at the Albany for the first time. The more I got to know him, the more I knew they fit. The almost-clutter fitted with his lifestyle, his order and taste. Everything fitted perfectly. I suspected he had memorised every poem he had on the walls. His rooms held a life, a world. It made me think of the clinical emptiness of my flat in Mount Street, where I had sold everything of personal or economic value. The furniture that was barely mine. The thought of returning there after stepping into these rooms made me cold. It wasn’t just the rooms, it was Raffles in them. His presence, his taste. I remember the books that he had lying out, as though he had been browsing them before his friends visited. The more I became acquainted with my old friend, the more those rooms began to fit around him. He would leave me in that front room as he got ready and I would browse the bookshelves, examine the paintings, read the poetry he had hanging on his wall.

I remember as we returned from taking lunch at the club, finding the room disordered. The books tossed about in ways that could not be good for their binding. The paintings removed from the walls, a copy of Millais’ ‘Ophelia’ with the glass smashed and the canvas damaged. My first thought was that we had been robbed, that it was a vengeance for our own crimes. But Raffles caught onto the truth faster, stepping over a tipped chair into the bedroom, the door of which was open.

“Inspector! How good to see you on this fine afternoon. I would ask you to take a seat but I see you have made yourself at home.” I had no desire to see Mackenzie; I felt anger bubble up inside my chest and I did not wish to unleash it, even on the perpetrator of such a crime. Instead I remained and began picking up the books and placing them on the shelves, hoping that the criminals at Scotland Yard had not done any irreparable damage. I swept off the glass from Ophelia, picking up the painting in its frame carefully. I had bought it for Raffles a year ago, when visiting some distant relatives on the coast. The rip went through her neck. “I trust you know, Mackenzie, that I will report you for this. You have damaged my private property, broken into my home when I was out, made me feel unsafe here. I trust you understand the irony of a police inspector doing such a thing.”

It was rare that Raffles was so blunt in conversation with Mackenzie. Even from the next room I could feel his anger. Or perhaps that was my own. There was a crack in Raffles’ best coffeepot, which I new had not been there this morning. I did not feel too scared at the intrusion of Mackenzie. I suppose the anger helped me combat it. Raffles knew how to hide the loot. We had not stolen anything in over a month now. For once I thought we might be innocent.

I was crouched on the floor reading a poem when I heard Raffles cough slightly, I stood up quickly as I noticed Mackenzie looking down at me. I knew wiping my eyes would make it clear that they were wet. Raffles stepped away, poured two whiskeys, held his hand on my shoulder as he gave it to me. I drank it readily, I suspect too much so. But I was shaken by the experience, the anger was beginning to subside into an absent kind of grief. I knew even then that I was being silly, that I had lost nothing, that we would be able to put everything away, replace the glass on the painting. But the whole room felt corrupted now, I knew that if Mackenzie had done this once he could do it again. I glared at the police inspector.

“Inspector.” I nodded at him, about a minute too late for it to seem polite or natural. I did not care.

“Well, my dear Bunny, the inspector thought to take it upon him to search my rooms for evidence of a crime. I have explained to him for the hundredth such time that we are innocent of any such offence, but since he decided to carry out such an  _ extreme _ form of action…” to took a sip of his own whiskey, “I have chosen to make myself more emphatic in my response.”

I will not recount my friend’s actions that day, for fear of sullying him in the readers’ opinions. He lost his temper with the inspector, said things that I know I would regret. He had no need to resort to violence if he truly wished to wound. He told the inspector that this was far from his purview and this ransacking of private property would not look good if it got out. Once Mackenzie had left he poured two more whiskeys and helped me tidy up the mess. His rooms looked much the same when he had finished, somehow as ordered as before. But it took some time for them to feel the same as they had.

Always, even after we had replaced the glass, the rip ran across Ophelia’s neck into the river around her. Every time I looked at the canvas I felt a spark of that anger once more, an absent wish for revenge left over from long ago.


End file.
